Trying Again: A Review of Legoland Florida

The unmistakable entrance to the Legoland parks appears here as well.

Florida’s newest theme park is also its oldest.  Last year, Legoland Florida brought the popular little bricks to the sunshine state and gave the park new life.   To review Legoland based solely on the last year and a half does a great disservice to what was once the premier destination for Florida tourists.

Way back in 1936, Orlando was still a small town most people hadn’t heard of, Legos were only known to a few Danes, and a small botanical garden opened up in sleepy Winter Haven, Florida.  Dick Pope and his wife Julie opened the gardens on the northeast shore of Lake Eloise, one of the many many lakes central Florida had to offer.  In 1943, the park grew beyond the garden with the addition of a ski show.  Soon, the beautiful sprawling gardens and the daily ski shows began pulling in the crowds… and not just snow birds flying south for the winter.  From Elvis to Johnny Carson, stars from all over visited the grounds, making them more popular than ever.  Dick Pope Sr. became known as Mr. Florida, a testament to the parks popularity as the Florida icon.

Then in 1971 came Black Friday.  45 minutes up the road, crowds packed the gates of Walt Disney World’s Magic Kingdom.  The park hoped to coexist.  The early Florida attractions market was a very friendly place.  But now the intersection of I-4 and the Florida Turnpike was the place to be.  Soon SeaWorld joined the mix and EPCOT followed a decade after in 1982.  Through all of this Cypress tried to keep up.  In 1974 they added some small rides and a zoo.  1983 saw an observation tower that looked and felt ahead of its time.  Island in the Sky was the first Intamin Flying Island, one of only five built and the only one in this hemisphere.  But despite the sense of positivity that appeared in many papers, Cypress Gardens was headed for tumultuous times.

Historic photo of the flying island. Courtesy of Intamin’s product brochure, http://www.intaminworldwide.com.

1985 saw the park’s first change of management as the Harcourt Branch Javonovich publishing company swooped in to acquire not only Cypress Gardens but also Circus World (Boardwalk and Baseball later) and SeaWorld.  Just four years later Busch Entertainment took over.  Though the park saw expansion, the numbers didn’t hold.  1995 saw yet another change in management.  One last attempt to revitalize the grounds saw the “Wacky Water Park” open and effectively ruin any kind of class that a name like Cypress Gardens carried.  But pandering to the kids only works so well, especially when faced with the plummeting attendance numbers in a post September 11^th world.  Only two short years later, Cypress Gardens closed its doors for the first time.

For some people, the story didn’t end there.  An amazing grassroots campaign raised 13.5 million dollars to help save Cypress Gardens.  Kent Buesher, founder of Wild Adventures theme park in zoo in Valdosta, Georgia purchased the park in hopes of expanding the appeal by adding an amusement park portion alongside the traditional botanical gardens.  If anyone should know how to turn a park in the middle of nowhere into a success, it would have been the owner of Wild Adventures.  But before the park could open its gates, not 1, not 2, but 3 Hurricanes decided to ruin the fun.  A few months later in November of 2004, however, the new Cypress Gardens was ready to go, opening with the gardens and a large rides section including a disappointing amount of off the shelf rides from Vekoma and Zamperla.  From a coaster enthusiast standpoint, the biggest fanfare occurred in 2007 with the relocation of Starliner, a 1963 wooden coaster that formerly operated in Panama City Beach.  But sadly, this newfound excitement was short-lived.

Buesher’s company filed for bankruptcy in 2006, leading to several sales and closures of the park before the park’s gates closed in 2009.  And on that depressing note, we reach the original intent of this article… a review of Legoland.

It took only two years for the park to reopen under the Legoland branding.  Florida’s world of bricks became Legoland number six and the second in America.  To many it seemed an odd choice to pick a site with such a tumultuous history.   But with infrastructure, rides, and history already in place, the development began.  Legoland brought a few new rides, new infrastructure, new theming, and a lot of cleanup to the tired park.   A new waterpark to replace the old one only seemed to sweeten the deal.  So how does it do?

On the surface, I really like Legoland.  It’s understated, but pretty and has a lot of fun little details in the form of Lego sculptures.  Legoland staples such as the Dragon and Technic themed coasters make their way into the fabric of the new park.  Obviously the park aims at a young crowd and isn’t afraid to show it.  The water ski shows that put Cypress Gardens on the map in the first place have returned under a Lego pirate theme.  Though it’s nice to see the ski show element maintained, we’ve come a long way from the impressive feats of six person skiing pyramids (though if skiing guys in giant Lego minifig costumes is what you’re looking for, this is your show).  Thankfully, the gardens have still been largely untouched and even maintained by the new owners.

The new face of Cypress Gardnes’ ski shows.

The only Lego addition: Southern Belles replacing the real ones that used to pose for pictures.

I never had the pleasure to experience Cypress Gardens before the brick invasion, but seeing the gardens as they are now makes me wish I had.  Legoland has taken the time to preserve and maintain what put the park on the map in the first place.  They are certainly a little worse for wear, but that’s nothing that can’t be fixed over time (something the new owners have apparently committed to).  The river channel that used to carry small boats on garden tours is mostly overgrown, but the magnificent banyan tree has been well groomed and still towers over everything.  It appears that there are more gardens yet to be reopened, so I certainly hope Legoland will carry through in the next few years.  Surprisingly, the gardens were the highlight of my trip and something I would spend more time exploring in future visits.

Remains of the Cypress Gardens boat tour.

 

The massive banyan tree in the gardens.

Though the gardens are pretty, the main draw for the park still belongs to the rides.  They are nothing to write home about but for some notable exceptions.  Starliner only made it a year before being removed by Legoland during park construction, so we must settle for Coastersaurus, a 2004 Martin and Vleminckx junior wooden coaster.  While from the outside the ride looks like nothing special, the junior PTC trains still use a buzz bar lap bar system (with no seatbelts for adults!) and the coaster rides and feels like a small classic design.  Nearly 30 years on, the Island in the Sky still impresses.   Besides looking fantastic and entirely unique to the observation tower market, the ride provides a wonderful panoramic view of the park, gardens, and the surrounding Lake Eloise.  Perhaps more sadly, it provides a reminder of what once was – the remnants of the zoo crumble just south of the ride.  The last of the truly interesting rides is Lost Kingdom Adventure, a shooting dark ride by the Sally Company out of Jacksonville.  A simple shooting system and nice theming (just nice, however) lead to a ride that’s not only enjoyable, but a wonderful escape from the heat.

Coastersaurus’ kid-friendly lift hill size.

This last thought makes a good transition into what I will politely call the ‘concerns’ of Legoland.  Shade is a covetous thing in Florida and Legoland has nearly none.  Scroll up to the old picture of the Island in the Sky again—see the covered queue line?  Gone.   This is only one of the many great places to begin to look like a lobster.  Sadly the park has a good many shade trees, but it seems like a large portion were plowed over or avoided in the layout of the paths.  The best place to go to escape the heat is the original gardens.   The wide concrete paths show an expectation of crowds to follow.  Crowds that I don’t believe are materializing like Legoland hopes.

Lego Miniland looks fantastic, but it’s baking in the sun. Those inviting looking trees in the background only just reach the path edges.

I visited the park on a Saturday in July.  These are the days all park financial officers look forward to.  But at Legoland there was a worryingly small amount of people.  The first concern was seeing ride waits of 5 minutes.  The only long waits occurred on very low capacity rides like Coastersaurus (that not only has a complicated loading procedure, but also tends to seat less than the quoted 20 people).  While I’m sure there were a number of people in the waterpark, the less than half filled parking lot was telling.  There were some waits up to 30 minutes, but that was only for the rides that had capacity issues like the one train Coastersaurus and the powered Safari Trek ride.  Rides which could handle more people like Lost Kingdom Adventure or the Dragon coaster had little to no lines all day.  This is a big difference from the park’s opening few weeks when they hit capacity a few times and seemed to be riding the tide of publicity.  Maybe the shininess has worn off?

I mentioned earlier that I realize Legoland is geared for younger kids.  With that in mind, I would like to comment on some accessibility issues that I found unfortunate.  While not Legoland’s fault, Coastersaurus runs with a junior PTC train and a rule that two adults may not share a seat.  Though other parks do offer this ability it is a tight squeeze.  While the park can’t do much about an inherited ride, adding a second train on the obvious pre-station track made for such a thing would be beneficial.  The real complaint comes with the Jungle Trek ride where guests board two-seater mini Jeeps and ride around a powered track looking at Lego animals.  That’s great… assuming you’re not two adults.  Now I’m unsure about the history of this ride (as in if it is a stock model or not), but to me it seems like a few extra inches all around would be a relatively simple manufacturing decision and also allow for a larger group of visitors to take part together.  To say that I felt a little silly tooling around in a mini jeep by myself would be something of an understatement.

Squeeze it in there.

In general, I think the park could benefit with just a few additions.  More rides that appeal not only to kids but to the family in general (there are *plenty* of things that I would find lots of fun that still fit the Legoland market).  While another coaster would be great (how about a Lego themed motorbike?), I think some flat rides or traditional park water rides like a log flume would do wonders.  Aside from rides, the park would greatly benefit from added infrastructure.  It seems like the paths and the landscape are mostly prepared, so I would love to see an added restaurant or two (perhaps something on the higher end with table service) as well as some gift shops that sell things other than just Lego sets.  The current culinary options certainly fill most of the needs (don’t forget to try the Granny Smith Apple Fries!), but I would love to see options expanded especially with the potential creative ways Legos could be worked into the experience.  As for the shops, I would have gladly purchased Legoland Florida branded magnets or shot glasses (my collection of choice, likely branded ‘toothpick holders’ at a place like this), but they were nowhere to be found.  Lastly, shade, shade, and more shade would be a welcome addition anywhere in the park.

Apple Fries– actually not bad!

Legoland has a fair amount of potential and certainly a lot of history going for it.  I do believe they will have to pour a substantial amount of money into the property to see it still running come a decade from now.  While I enjoyed the experience, I would find myself hard pressed to pay the full price for a one day ticket, a whopping $87 at the gate.  There is no excuse to be charging Disney, SeaWorld, and Universal prices while delivering far less content.  If you’re feeling like making poor decisions, you could shell out $2,500 for a lifetime pass to just Legoland Florida and the waterpark.  That’s a hefty number for a park which might not even make it another five years!  Legoland Malaysia is nearly ready to open and seems to have a number of great rides to go along with it.  Maybe Legoland Florida can learn a thing or two and continue the storied tradition of Florida’s original tourist attraction.

The Island in the Sky still looks fantastic, though not more like a circus tent!

 

 

Skyrush!

Check out these 2 pictures of Skyrush at Hersheypark.  Absolutely gorgeous.  I’ll always love the way Hershey intertwines their coasters.   (click to enlarge)

Both of these pictures come from www.coastersandmore.de.  I can’t speak (or read) any German, but I look for the fantastic photography.  I highly recommend the site!

Coaster Names: The Best of the Worst

A roller coaster is typically the biggest investment any park will make. Therefore, it seems reasonable that parks would put some time and consideration into picking the best possible name that’s catchy, memorable, and in a lot of cases describes the ride.

And then there’s some that fail at some or all of those things. I’ve selected a few of what I would call the best of the worst coaster names. I’ve split it into two sections—the west and the east. Asia has a plethora of hilarious names, but a lot of that can be chalked up to poor translation. The ones in Europe and America (mostly the US!) have no excuse.

Western Parks

Roller Coaster, New York New York Hotel & Casino, Nevada

Courtesy of Christopher Sladky, http://www.gallery.fulllaunch.com.

There are lots of coasters imaginatively named ‘Coaster.’ But this one makes the list for the simple fact that they changed the ride’s name from something good to something entirely bland and generic. Manhattan Express was a great name for a poor coaster. Now, I suppose, the name matches the ride.

Wild Eagle, Dollywood, Tennessee

‘Eagle’ might have been too plain, but Wild Eagle seems redundant. After all, they aren’t going to name it ‘Domesticated Eagle.’ My general assumption is that this eagle is already free. You don’t need to tell me again.

Cornball Express, Indiana Beach, Indiana

Perhaps some Indiana people can enlighten me on what exactly a ‘cornball’ is. I feel like there would be very few responses that could redeem this name. Thankfully, the coaster does that on its own, being the best ride at Indiana Beach.

Montezooma’s Revenge, Knotts Berry Farm, California

Courtesy of Christopher Sladky, http://www.gallery.fulllaunch.com.

It’s probably not the best of practices to name a coaster the same thing as a slang term for diarrhea. There’s also an Aztec ruler out there that’s pretty upset… since apparently he’s out for revenge. Maybe it’s just me, but revenge seems less effective when the instrument is a source of fun.

Hundeprutterutchebane, Bon Bon Land, Denmark

The full disclosure on this one is that I actually love the name. I think it’s fantastic *because* it’s strange. Actually, all of Bon Bon Land is strange—check it out sometime. A Danish candymaker started the park and themed some of the rides after the candies the company made—like the Hundeprutter, a dog turd shaped treat. And yes, riders on the coaster do get farted on courtesy of a little speaker inside a dog house prop. Keep it classy, Denmark.

Die! Wilde Maus, Serengeti Park, Germany

For anyone who speaks German, this makes perfect sense to you. Essentially, it’s saying ‘The’ Wild Mouse with an emphasis on ‘the’ as that specific ride. But it’s the American in me that laughs at the sign that puts such emphasis on the park’s obvious dislike of this rodent.

Bizarro, Six Flags New England, Massachusetts & Six Flags Great Adventure, New Jersey

In 2009, Six Flags renamed Medusa at SF Great Adventure and Superman at SF New England as ‘Bizarro’. These were both incredibly popular rides, but for some reason Six Flags decided to retheme them purple and blue, add some cheap effects, and rename them after an obscure comic book character. The only thing bizarre here is the theme choice [yes, that was a bad joke—please laugh a little!]

Cheetah Hunt, Busch Gardens Tampa, Florida

Turns out that 120 minute wait was actually 4 hours!

When the coaster was being built, all the rumors for the ride pointed to the name as Cheetaka. I don’t know what a Cheetaka is, but at least it sounds cool. Cheetah Hunt just makes you wonder if you’re the one hunting the cheetahs…

Colorado Adventure: The Michael Jackson Thrill Ride, Phatasialand, Germany

Right off the bat this is a concerning name for a family coaster. But beyond that, the ride seemingly has nothing to do with Michael Jackson aside from the little sign with the ride’s name at the entrance. It’s just your standard highly themed mine train coaster… no King of Pop here.

Hollywood Rip, Ride, Rockit, Universal Studios, Florida

“Are you ready to rock out making music video history?” So says the safety spiel before the ride. If the general theme of making a music video wasn’t confusing enough, the name might be even worse. It’s like they threw some action words together that sounded intense. By that approach we could just have easily seen Hollywood Nitro, Flash, Thriller.

Gotham City Gauntlet Escape from Arkham Asylum, Six Flags New England, Massachusetts

Lastly for the western parks it’s back to SF New England for what might be the longest coaster name out there. They picked a decidedly average coaster for a name that tries to describe everything in the Batman universe at once. As an aside, this is the only case I know of where a park bought a coaster without proper planning permission, had to take down the building and sell the coaster, and then bought a used one and opened it up a 3 years later.

Asian (Eastern) Parks

I’m sure most of these coasters are just mistranslations, but some are too amusing to pass up.

Family Banana Coaster, Yokohama Cosmoworld, Japan

I wonder why bananas over other fruits?

Sky Scrapper, World Joyland, China

I suppose we didn’t need the sky anyways.

High Altitude Rolling Sliding Coaster, Window of the World, China

This would be better if it was called High Altitude Bumping Bruising Coaster. Just look at those transitions..

Hand Roller Coaster, Harbin Amusement Park, China

The Chinese name translates to ‘Steel Dragon Inverted Coaster,’ which means either their sign vendor screwed them or their translations department missed the mark by a mile.

Dizzy Love and Whirling Passion, Discoveryland, China

This name sounds vaguely dirty. However when you get off this coaster I’m quite certain you could be dizzy and also find yourself with a new passion of hating the ride.

Heaven on Earth, Xixiakou China, China

The same model coaster as the two above, this name couldn’t have gone in a more opposite direction. Though with the way some of these coasters are made in China, this might get you to heaven a little faster.

Superspeed Cool-Cool Bear, Beijing Amusement Park, China

Though sadly closed now, this ride wins the award as my favorite coaster name. As the words on the station building said, “Come on, Don’t hesitate!”

Can you think of something I missed? Be sure to comment and maybe I’ll do a ‘Part II’ a little later down the road.

2012: The Mid-Year Review

I had originally started writing a post for the beginning of this year picking my 12 most anticipated 2012 coasters and going into detail about them.  As it turns out, I’m long winded… and the post never got finished.  So let’s compare my list from then with how I feel now after hearing reviews form a number of these rides.

From my list written in January I had:

12. Big Grizzly Mountain Runaway Mine Cars, Hong Kong Disneyland, Hong Kong

11. Swarm, Thorpe Park, Great Britain

10. Superman: Ultimate Flight, Six Flags Discovery Kingdom, California

9. Wild Eagle, Dollywood, Tennessee

8. Shambhala, PortAventura, Spain

7. Manta, SeaWorld San Diego, California

6. Oz’Iris, Parc Asterix, France

5. Woden Timbur Coaster, Europa Park, Germany

4. Leviathan, Canada’s Wonderland, Canada

3. Dauling Dragon, Happy Valley, China

2. Verbolten, Busch Gardens Williamsburg, Virginia

1. Skyrush, Hersheypark, Pennsylvania

These got left out, but still warrant a note:

• Iron Shark, Galveston Island Historic Pleasure Pier, Texas
• Bullet Coaster, Happy Valley Shenzhen, China
• X-Flight, Six Flags Great America, Illinois

So how does it all shake out halfway through the season?  Most of this list is open now, except for the Hong Kong Disney Coaster and Superman: What the Heck in California.

Big Grizzly Mountain Happy China Lucky Panda Runaway Mine Cars is still receiving finishing touches, but it does look pretty nice.  It will undoubtedly have the usual Disney quality and charm, and their somehow magical ability to turn Vekomas decent.  This should be a hit for the park.

Swarm has gotten some very positive reviews due to the theming, and I’ll credit Thorpe for really stepping up the game on that front.  Still, the coaster just looks short to me.  If only they could have taken X-Flight’s layout and added Swarm’s theming.  Still, I think that deserves to go up at least a little on the list.

Superman is still the strangest coaster I’ve seen in a little while, but I think it has the potential to be good, even great.  If you ignore the fact that it’ll probably be broken down half the time and will also have a capacity of roughly 20 an hour, I think it’s something to look forward to.  It’s like a less practical Intamin impulse, but one that will probably be more fun.  Just get in line early and bring a tent…

I was unimpressed with Wild Eagle’s layout when it was first announced, mostly because it felt like something any floorless or sit down coaster could do.  It also seemed short in length for its height.  That said, the coaster really seems to have lived up to its potential.  While maybe standard, the inversions are very interesting with the wing coaster seating arrangement… especially the loop.  The finale figure 8 is low to the ground and swoops by lots of trees, which also improves things.   I think this has the potential to go up a little in the standings and seems to fit the ‘don’t judge a book by its cover’ mantra.

Shambhala looks incredible—it’s one of my favorites this year from a purely aesthetic standpoint.  B&M hyper coasters are hard to judge by looks alone though.  Some seem to crawl over the hills but deliver fantastic sustained airtime while riding.  I think this will fall somewhere in the middle, with a good, but not amazing ride.  The theming is above average, though the ‘water splash’ effect is fake (cheaters!).  The helix is still absolutely gorgeous, even if the ride looks too slow at the peak.

If this was based purely on restraints alone, I’d vote Manta as number 1.  Mack launched coaster restraints are wonderful—very open and small for a coaster type that can perform inversions.  Manta wraps up the SeaWorld Parks & Entertainment launched coaster trio and is undoubtedly the most ‘family’ of the 3.  While still retaining great coaster elements and having a very cool launch tunnel projection, the ride falls short from a coaster thrill standpoint.  While arguably this is exactly what the park was shooting for, this list is looking at quality of coaster and the ride will take a small hit down the list.  Still, the park has a winner on their hands—exactly what SeaWorld San Diego needs.  Now just finish the landscaping that I hope is still missing!

Oz’iris wins the award for most underrated ride.  It was special to see a B&M inverted coaster being built, much less a custom one.  But Parc Asterix pulled out all the stops on theming.  The ride, queue, and all the surroundings are very well themed and show just how much effort the park put into making this more than just a coaster.  And from reports, Oz’iris really is more than just a coaster… it’s gone back to the glory days of intense B&M coasters that were known for their power and intensity.  The ride has an interesting layout—the first dive loop on an invert, no pre-drop piece, and an inversion order that certainly borders on strange.  But that’s ok and even encouraged… it’s clear Oz’iris is a ride not to be overlooked.

Europa Park looks great—lots of coasters and a great them.  For me, it’s all the quirky coasters that do it… a bobsled, vertical lift mouse, a coaster that just turns in one direction…  But this year, they added something more mainstream.  GCI has made a name for themselves in the wooden coaster business, culminating in an insane blend of height, speed, and terrain last year in China.  Wodan seems to draw some elements from it… the ride is tall, fast, and spread out.  That said, it may be almost *too* spread out.  What makes GCI coasters great are the quick direction changes and little pops of airtime here and there.  While they’re still visible, the overall experience seems to be lacking.  Thematically the ride is gorgeous and not to be missed, but I think in terms of ride quality it will leave the rider wanting a bit more.

I’ve written about why I think Leviathan is ridiculous, so I’ll try not to rehash all of that.  Regardless of how I feel, we now have the first +300’ B&M and two opportunities to ride the same type of coaster at Canada’s Wonderland.  Does it live up to the hype?  I’d put the answer as a solid sorta.  Yes, it’s big and fast and tall and will have some great floating airtime.  But part of me is still disappointed in how stretched out the coaster is and how it ends with so much potential left (the final brakes are taller than the entirety of Dragon Fire!).  If it weren’t for the park already having a hyper, I’d rate this higher I think, but the ride in general is just a little perplexing.  Still, I’m incredibly excited to ride this later in the year to see if the opinions hold true.

China continues to provide the first word on quality named attractions.  Dauling Dragon opened nearly 2 months ago and I’ve yet to see a single review.  Perhaps I’m not searching hard enough.  From looks alone, the ride seems pretty spectacular.  The ‘high five’ element is probably a lot of nothing on the ride, but from the ground I’m sure it’s a great visual.  Afterwards the ride seems relatively unremarkable; though does throw in some pretty nice looking duel (daul?) spots and a flowing layout to connect them all.  My main worry comes with the trains.. PTCs are not great in handling intense corner-heavy coasters and Dragon is the picture of that.  Unless they can put some good maintenance into the thing (because we all know how likely that is to happen) I expect future guests are in for a rough ride.

Enthusiasts will never forgive Busch Gardens for removing Big Bad Wolf.  Verbolten tries its best to help with some of that, but it will always be a sore spot.  As one of Zierer’s first attempts on a big stage, it was largely a ‘wait and see’ ride and it seems like the coaster has met most expectations and exceeded in others.  The theme certainly shines, with a great queue line and developed story.  In the enclosed portion of the ride, there are 3 different options for the story, which adds a lot to re-rideability.  And while the vertical drop element is a pretty big gimmick, it works well on the ride and adds a lot of excitement.  In general, I’d liked to have seen the outdoor portion be a little longer and the ‘broken bridge’ scene taken a little faster.  That said, Verbolten is about as good of a replacement that could possibly be for Big Bad Wolf without getting rid of the ‘family’ coaster sticker.

There are often those rides that look amazing from the start, but often don’t live up the hype.  I think I can safely say that Skyrush is distinctly not one of those.  Hershey continues to impress with Skyrush, completing their Intamin trio.   From all angles this ride looks great.  The speed leads to incredible airtime and intensity, though from multiple reports it also leads to leg pain as the forces shove down the lap bar even further.  But still, I can look past that for the simple fact that they used a lap bar!  It’s great to see a park pass on the over the shoulder restraint that’s become so standard.  Hershey does a great job shoving rides into areas where they have no business fitting and Skyrush is no exception.  Comet now has a new friend, and the river & picnic grounds are far more exciting with a bright yellow Intamin roaring past.  For me, this is clearly the best of 2012.

Six months later, this is how I would rank the best of 2012 now:

12. Big Grizzly Mountain Runaway Mine Cars, Hong Kong Disneyland, Hong Kong

11. Manta, SeaWorld San Diego, California

10. Superman: Ultimate Flight, Six Flags Discovery Kingdom, California

9. Swarm, Thorpe Park, Great Britain

8. Woden Timbur Coaster, Europa Park, Germany

7. Shambhala, PortAventura, Spain

6. Leviathan, Canada’s Wonderland, Canada

5. Wild Eagle, Dollywood, Tennessee

4. Dauling Dragon, Happy Valley, China

3. Verbolten, Busch Gardens Williamsburg, Virginia

2. Oz’Iris, Parc Asterix, France

1. Skyrush, Hersheypark, Pennsylvania  

Skyrush stays at number one and Oz’iris makes the biggest jump upwards.  But since this is the Internet and people have opinions—what do *you* think?  How would you rank them?  Which have you ridden?  Full disclosure for this piece is that I have not ridden any yet, but if all goes as planned, I will have Leviathan, Wild Eagle, and Skyrush by September.

It’s Just Like Before

I like to think I know a lot about the theme park industry.  Sure, that sounds a little arrogant, but I think any enthusiast who’s been in and around the industry for more than a decade could probably make that claim.  Things follow expected logic and we can usually see things coming whether it be from past history or through the rumor mill.

On August 18^th, Canada’s Wonderland introduced Leviathan.  It will be the biggest and fastest coaster in Canada and brings with it the notable title of being B&Ms first coaster over 300ft.  A few years ago a giga from B&M would be unheard of—unless you had 50 million dollars and were somewhat crazy.  But now we see this hyper coaster, topping out at 306ft. with a long sweeping out and back layout with airtime hills.  At most any park this would be an incredible addition—dominating the skyline and offering the newest and biggest thrills in the park.  But this isn’t most any park.. it’s Canada’s Wonderland.

In 2008, Canada’s Wonderland made the huge announcement for Behemoth.  Canada had never seen anything like it.  230 ft., 77 mph, 5318 ft. long—it broke all the records in Canada.  The skyline of the park which had been dominated by the likes of such wonders as an SLC and an Arrow suspended coaster now had a giant B&M hyper coaster towering over the rest of the attractions.  With incredible amounts of airtime and a new stadium style setback seating, Behemoth opened to rave reviews.  And all was well in the world.

Did these two paragraphs seem similar?  Well let’s compare:

	Behemoth	Leviathan
Manufacturer	Bolliger & Mabillard	Bolliger & Mabillard
Height	230ft.	306 ft.
Speed	77 mph	92 mph
Length	5318 ft.	5486 ft.
Drop Style	Straight, 75 degrees	Straight, 80 degrees
Seating / Restraint	4 across, clamshell restraints	4 across, clamshell restraints

The stats alone show how similar these rides are, but let’s take a look at the layouts:

Behemoth has a nice out and back design—straight drop, far turnaround, midcourse brakes, twists, brakes.  And lots and lots of airtime in between.   Leviathan is like the first half of Carowind’s Intimidator took some steroids.  The layout is nearly the same in terms of overall flow.  But comparing Wonderland’s two layouts together side by side, it’s startlingly similar.  You have to imagine a bunch of guys sitting around in design meetings pointing at a picture of Behemoth and going “that, just bigger.”  Now there’s nothing wrong with that.. but usually when you do that you’re looking at another park.

All this is said not to put down these coasters—Behemoth is wonderful and I’m sure Leviathan will be as well.  The purpose of this is just to wonder where the creativity went.  Essentially to ask “what were you thinking!?”  Canada’s Wonderland spent $28 million on this coaster.  That’s easily pushing the upper end of coaster prices.  At that price we can pretty much say that they could’ve had anything they wanted.  So rather than getting another big airtime coaster focused on speed it seems to me like there’s plenty of other things 28 million could have bought:

•          B&M Dive Machine
•          Intamin Giga Coaster like I305 that does something different than Behemoth
•          Intamin or B&M wing coaster
•          Anything at all that has a launch stronger than Stunt Coaster [hint: that’s everything]
•          Any large looping coaster: floorless, sitdown, etc.
•          2 or 3 more SLCs scattered around the park

For a park with a great mix of flat rides, their coaster selection has always come off as something of a mystery considering they were all decidedly average.  Until Behemoth.  Now, it seems like there ought to be some variety for the next big purchase.  But apparently there’s something to be said about sticking with what works.  Until then, we enjoy the coaster while lamenting about all the cool, unique other rides we could have had.

Of course, we can’t just pick on Canada’s Wonderland… we can pick on Canada as a whole instead!

It seems head-scratching coaster choices aren’t limited to Toronto.  In 2010, La Ronde debuted Ednor: L’Attaque.  This coaster came via a field at the Great Escape and before that from the sadly defunct Six Flags AstroWorld.  But one has to wonder who said “Yes, we’ll take your used SLC.”  Unless you’re desperate or a small park, that’s a phrase you’ll rarely hear.  I can’t speak for desperate, but La Ronde is not a small park.  In fact, they’re big enough to already have an inverted coaster… a better inverted coaster.  La Ronde already had a B&M mirror image Batman clone.  You could possible see starting with an SLC and then later upgrading to the B&M with the SLC removed, but two at once is just strange.

But our maple syrup soaked neighbors aren’t the only ones making questionable ride additions.  Take Holiday World, home of free soda, great wooden coasters, and some of the friendliest owners you’ll ever meet.  Next year they’ll debut Mammoth, a massive up and down water coaster 6 person circular rafts.  It starts with a lift and features drops and inclines going in and out of enclosed tubes, all built into the hillside.  Oh, and it’s also the longest water coaster out there.  This is a fantastic addition… unless you look to the left and see Wildebeest.  Wildebeest opened only one year ago as the longest water coaster out there.  It does essentially the same thing—lift, hills, turns, enclosed tubes, tunnels—just with 2 person rafts rather than 6.  While it’s nice to cater to different party sizes, Mammoth essentially makes Wildebeest obsolete.

Going back to Cedar Fair parks, we can take a look at Dorney Park which likes to make a habit of repeating itself.  Rather than send Cedar Point’s old Intamin first generation drop tower to a Cedar Fair park that has no drop tower, it winds up at Dorney Park… which already has a double S&S shot and drop tower (with a 3^rd tower all set to get an air canister).  It’s like turning back the clock to get an older version of the ride when there’s already something that beats it in every category.  Of course, something can always be said for the classics—it just seems like Demon Drop could have been far better served elsewhere.  And while not necessarily the same thing, it’s worth noting their newest attraction- the Vekoma invertigo from California’s greatest adventure.  And while it is notable for being the best of the three types of boomerangs, it’s also coming to a park that has 2 inverted coasters, including a forwards/backwards impulse coaster.  Still, there’s some variety there, though it is a shame they continue to get used rides.

There’s undoubtedly more examples out there—feel free to send in some others in the comments!  In summary: we’re asking Canada’s Wonderland whhhhhyyyy????  But still.. thanks for the coaster!

Fun with Communism

It’s been awhile.  The Disney project is finished now, so hopefully there will be some news about that coming up.  And it always figures that college classes all like to assign things at the same time, so that’s been a pain.  I had started writing this entry back when the Olympics were on TV.  So here’s something to think about: it would be much cooler if the Mack bobsleds were like real bobsleds… i.e. huge and with speeds pushing 90mph.  That said, I really can’t complain about the current Mack bobsleds… Avalanche at Kings Dominion was pretty fantastic.

Today we’re going to visit the land of semi communism.  China has been experiencing the coaster boom everybody else wishes they had.  If you haven’t paid attention to what’s been going on over there, you’re really missing out on some fantastic stuff.  We’re gonna back up 4 years and see what’s opened.  I’ll say that again… 4 years.

2006

Coasters Opened: 19 over 11 parks

Notables (i.e. stuff bigger than a family coaster)

4 Ring Roller Coaster- Daguan Park, Yunnan

If you go back through time, you’ll find this type of coaster appear over and over in some form or another.  China loves these things.  The most common layout is a loop and two corkscrews, although you’ll find anything from two corks, one loop, two loops, or even a helix before the drop.  But this sort of layout is what you’ll see the most of when you travel through China.  And if you think these types by Arrow or Vekoma or bad, go try these manufacturers.

Flight of the Phoenix, Harborland Theme Park

This is the 3^rd copy of Intamin’s 8 inversion coaster layout.  Oddly enough, one has opened every 4 years since 1998.  The layouts of these rides aren’t terribly creative, but the fact that it can shove 8 inversions in 100ft. of lift height is pretty impressive.  Of course, the ride pretty much has it all when it comes to inversions—loop, cobra roll, double corkscrews, and inline twists.  In fact, there’s enough inline twists to make it look like they just ran out of ideas, although unlike a certain coaster we’ll see later, this ride only has 3 inlines in a row.

Screaming Squirrel, Mysterious Island, Guangdong

The second and last of the stock S&S Screamin’ Squirrel  models gives Mysterious Island a cool looking, yet altogether pretty dull attraction.  We all know Stan Checketts is crazy, but the novelty of being suspended upside down for long periods at a time gets old pretty fast.  He should stick to trying to launch stuff with face flattening acceleration.

Chimelong Paradise, Guangdong

Although it didn’t get as much immediate recognition as did Happy Valley Beijing, Chimelong was one of the first parks where we all wondered “how can you afford these things!?”  The park opened with 5 coasters.  Although the first two were nothing more than a kiddie and a spinner from Golden Horse (a ride you’d wish upon no park), the last 3 were slightly larger rides.  An Intamin halfpipe, Vekoma motorbike, and only the 2^nd ever Intamin 10 inversion coaster completed the starting lineup.  The 10 inversion coaster was a big ‘up yours’ to Harborland, by throwing in another 2 inline twists to make the ride even less imaginative.  Speaking of less imaginative, we have the English names for these rides.  I hope more than anything else the Chinese names are more creative, but in terms of English we have: 10 Inversion Roller Coaster, Family Gravity Coaster, Half Pipe, Motorbike Launch Coaster, and Twister Coaster.  Take a guess as to which is which.  It’s pretty tough.

Happy Valley Beijing, Beijing

Beijing’s version of Happy Valley became the 2^nd of this chain of parks and soon became the park everybody pointed to when looking at the China coaster boom.  While it doesn’t look like the park is in a valley (disappointing in its own right),it does at least look happy… or well themed.  If you haven’t looked up some pictures from here, they’re worth checking out.  The theming is great, although pretty varied.  Happy Valley opened with 4 coasters, each with a rather curious name.   Harvest Time harkens back to the days of… working in a field?  That doesn’t sound terribly thrilling, which is a good fit for this Golden Horse spinner, which is probably also not so much fun.  Jungle Racing ups the theming a bit with a double lift Vekoma mine train through some pretty massive ruins and pretty thin jungle.  Golden Wings in Snowfield sounds awfully peaceful for a coaster that probably hurts like crap.  This custom SLC more or less copied the layout seen at the first Happy Valley park which was subsequently reproduced at Flamingoland with Kumali.  Thankfully (or maybe not), this coaster throws in an extra helix at the end.  Layout-wise, it makes it slightly less awful than the other similar ones, which is always a plus.  The final coaster is probably the most famous Chinese coaster in the enthusiast community (considering the most famous Chinese coaster outside the enthusiast community is probably none of them…).  Sticking with the wings theme, we have Crystal Wings, a B&M flying coaster.  Although it’s a Superman clone (or at least very similar), China got their first B&M as well as first flying coaster.  Unlike what Six Flags did with their flying coasters, the Happy Valley team got together and decided this coaster needed an f-ing huge city to around.  What looks to be about 175ft. worth of giant lost city offers a pretty darn cool setting to go flying through some canyons of fake brick and stucco.  I’ve not found out if you can go up into the city, but if not then it’s pretty disappointing.  Still, Crystal Wings is one of the coolest looking coasters out there.

Mad Cobra, Discoveryland, Liaoning

The last noteable coaster takes us to Discoveryland, yet another big new park to open this year.  Mad Cobra kind of cheats as it’s not a new coaster, but a relocated one from the Suzuka Circuit race track park in Japan.  Mad Cobra is what a hairball might look like as a coaster.  Suzuka got on the Premier launched coaster train back in the mid 90s when they were all the rage (a rage big enough to sell a whole 5).  But for the space, they got a pretty huge amount of coaster packed in there.  This may also be the first launched coaster in China, if it opened before Chimelong’s motorbike.

2007

Coasters Opened: 7 over 5 parks

FantaWild Adventure, Anhui

Sadly not themed to the soda brand, FantaWild was the biggest (and maybe only) new park to open in China in 2007.  This park was a great place for Golden Horse to practice ripping off real companies.   There’s only one picture of the fantastically named Space Vehicle on rcdb, but looking at the track, you can already see some misshapen stuff in the first helix.  Not a good start.  Hanging Pulley is a rip off of the suspended wild mice you might find on fair circuits back in Europe.  I think Zamperla makes them, which might actually not be any better than Golden Horse, which is kind of concerning.  Still, with the wild mouse corners, the ride looks like a recipe for unpleasantness.  The next ripoff is of the Vekoma inverted coaster layout we saw at Happy Valley Beijing.  Why anyone would want to ripoff Vekoma of all companies is beyond me, but this looks deceivingly like it might actually be good.  I’d hazard a pretty good guess to say it’s not.

2008

Coasters Opened: 10 over 8 parks

Beijing Shijingshan Amusement Park

This park is notable for the one fact that their website used to be b-samusementpark.com, which is pretty hilarious.  Sadly someone must have noticed as they’ve changed it now.  This park was also ripping off Disney mascots until somebody posted some pics up on the web.  That stopped pretty quickly.  As for these coasters, the first drops a layout with such exciting elements as flat track, few drops, and even a helix!  Thankfully, Jurassic Adventure puts the whole thing in a building and adds some pretty ok theming to make the ride itself bearable.  The 2^nd coaster is called Spinning Batman, which neither spins nor is related to Batman.  The ride is an odd single rail suspended coaster, the kind you really don’t see any more over here.  For a ride of this type, it’s on a pretty big scale… a tall vertical lift and a decent size layout.  The supports are cool in that they’ve been themed to look like trees.  Surprisingly enough, it’s actually pretty convincing as a thematic element.  If this park knows one thing, it’s how to make what are likely crappy coasters seem passable with nice theming.

Dive Coaster, Chimelong Paradise, Guangdong

Opening a year after the park, Dive Coaster continues Chimelong’s practice of giving coasters really obvious names.  Thankfully, the coaster more than makes up for the lack of creativity on the naming front.  At almost 200ft, the ride became the tallest coaster in China as well as the one with the more ridiculous looking trains.  Using nearly the same elements as SheiKra, Dive Coaster puts them together just a little different to create a custom layout.  This was the first B&M installation of the B&M dive coaster in China (although not the first in Asia with Taiwan’s G5).  At its opening Chimelong had the strongest coaster lineup in China, although 2009 would bring some stiff competition.

Unknown, Discoveryland, Liaoning

Apparently, this park isn’t visited so often as the name of this coaster is still listed as unknown.  Opening 2 years after the park, this coaster is an inverted coaster from Beijing Shibaolai Amusement Equipment.  As it turns out, there’s more than one company in China good at ripping off European rides.  This SLC ripoff is an unfortunate 137ft. tall, making it far larger than necessary to inflict a lot of pain.  There’s no other information about the layout, although if we look over at our friends from the BS Amusement Park, we find their very own inverted coaster from this company.  4 inversions are dropped into a rather awful looking layout including impressively bad transitions and even an airtime hill.  If Discoveryland’s coaster is any bit similar, I’d recommend staying away.

Vesuvius Volcano, FantaWild Adventure, Anhui

1 year after the other 3, Golden Horse gets another opportunity to rip off Vekoma at FantaWild Adventure (which still has nothing to do with the soda).  This mine train design at least looks really fantastic.  There’s no telling how good it runs, though.  You have to wonder how hard it is to screw up a mine train coaster, but you might be surprised.   By theming alone, the ride is easily the coolest looking in the park and potentially the most redeemable.  Hopefully it rides as good as it looks.

2009

Coasters Opened: 20 over 12 parks

Moto Coaster, Jin Jiang Action Park, Shanghai

Zamperla jumps in on the moto coaster action, opening their first one outside the U.S.  Although it’s the same layout as the OCC MotoCoaster at Darien Lake, this version gets launched faster and quicker.  This can only be a good thing since all OCC was lacking was a little more speed.  Unfortunately they still seems to be letting colorblind people take on the painting as the supports change from yellow to white all throughout the ride.  Aside from looking ridiculous, the coaster… well… just looks ridiculous.

Hand Roller Coaster, Harbin Amusement Park, Heilongjiang

Sometimes you just have to wonder if the Chinese pick the American versions of coaster names just to screw with us.  If you translate the Chinese name, it comes out Steel Dragon Inverted Coaster.  This is passable for the oddly specific generic Chinese coaster name.  However, the sign clearly has Hand Roller Coaster, so we’ll just assume they’re retarded.  This is another inverted coaster from Beijing Shibaolai Amusement Equipment with the same layout we looked at earlier.  The green and gray look kind of nice on the ride, but unfortunately pain can’t make a ride good.

Happy Valley Chengdu, Sichuan

With the Chinese finally discovering what good amusement parks are like, 2 more Happy Valley parks opened in 2009, upping the coaster quality in the process.   The first 3 coaster are pretty standard for these parks, a Golden Horse spinning coaster (Madrats), a Vekoma double lift mine train (Dragon in Snowfield), and the standard Vekoma inverted coaster seen at the other Happy Valleys (Dragon in Clouds).  As you can see, we continue the propensity for strange names.  Thankfully, Happy Valley decided it was time to bring in the big guns for their final coaster.  Fly over Mediterranean is an Intamin mega-lite (according to Intamin’s website, they’re “mega-good”).  Although under 110ft. tall, this coaster produces tons of airtime in a great layout.

Happy Valley Shanghai, Shanghai

After Happy Valley Chengdu, the board of directors must’ve sat around and thought up how they could make the park more awesome.  The current coaster lineup just wasn’t cutting it, so it was time to build the best park in China.  The park has 6 coasters, and some very impressive ones at that.  LeLe’s Chariot is the obligatory kids coaster from Golden Horse, but things get better from there.  With Spinning Coaster, the park decided it’d had enough of Golden Horse and mercifully opened a Zamperla model instead.  They won’t know what to do with a spinning coaster that’s semi-passible as a quality ride.  For Mine Train coaster, Happy Valley decided to go with Intamin instead of Vekoma.  In the process, they made a coaster infinitely cooler than any of the Vekoma mine train models and then proceeded to put it in a big fake mountain.  Dive Coaster became the biggest B&M Dive Machine in the world, although the layout is very similar to Sheikra.  Going back to Intamin, Happy Valley bought its 2^nd Mega-Lite, the park’s next large and awesome coaster.  But the most interesting ride in the park is Fireball, China’s first wooden coaster.  A Gravity Group design, the coaster throws twists in with airtime to create one heck of a layout.  The only question now is how well can a country with no experience in wooden coasters take care of this ride?  Gravity Group coasters are not kind to their equipment, so Happy Valley better be ready to take care of the ride if it’s to stay smooth.  But regardless of the future quality, Happy Valley’s coaster lineup makes it the strongest in China.

Giant Wheel Park of Suzhou, Suzhou

As if all these other parks weren’t enough, another park opened in 2009 with one of the more interesting coasters in the country.  Giant Wheel Park of Suzhou is based around a really big Ferris Wheel as I really hope you could guess.  The Chinese like their giant wheels for some reason, so it’s pretty natural to have a whole park based around one.  But for the coaster crowd, there’s Stingray: the return of the Vekoma flying coaster.  We saw 3 of their ‘Flying Dutchman’ model in the US backat the turn of the century and then nothing.  But the Stingray is different.  Packed into a tight little layout, the coaster features a vertical lift flipping backwards into the flying position.  Stingray has a pretty short layout, but throws in a few helixes and the first outwards half loop on a flying coaster.  The footprint is so tight that the brakes are actually located in an inversion as the train gets back to a station.  There hasn’t been much in the way of reports since this coaster has gone up, so hopefully this Vekoma hasn’t been met with the downtime some of their other ventures have experienced.

Nanjing East China Mall, Nanjing

We move to malls now.  Because shopping isn’t interesting enough, sticking a coaster in there helps things along.  Here in Nanjing, Vekoma is adding a custom motorbike coaster to the mall.  The size and speed are pretty average for the ride, but the layout is certainly going to be interesting as mall’s don’t usually have a big flat open space to stick a coaster.  Hopefully they’ll get creative.  Although this falls in with the 2009 listing, the ride is still listed as under construction.  Hopefully it’ll be opening soon.

Powerland, Shandong

The 2^nd of the mall coasters promises to be one of the more interesting Vekoma junior coaster layouts ever built.  Shell’s Shuttle winds down the mall corridors and curves around two plaza areas.  The ride is part of a larger amusement area within the mall and wraps around some of the other rides.  While it’s not as big or as fast as some of the other coasters this ride shows just how much can be done with the Vekoma junior coaster and makes us wish more malls in America decided to add coasters.

2010

Coasters: 12 over 7 parks

Dragon Rider, Floraland, Chengdu

As we make it to 2010, apparently Floraland didn’t get the memo that inverted coasters from Chinese companies are awful.  Unfortunately they’ve opened yet another instance of the inverted coaster we’ve seen in several parks over the last few years.  In one of those things you never think you’ll ever say: ‘won’t somebody buy an SLC!?’

Unknown, Tianjin Water Park, Tianjin

For some reason, water parks are getting in on the coaster boom too.  Unfortunately, this park is also building an inverted coaster.  While we hope for an SLC or even a B&M (in our wildest dreams), it’s likely to come from a Chinese company and be yet another instance of things you’d really rather not ride.

Flying Horse Family Coaster, Chimelong Paradise, Guangdong

Chimelong continues to add coasters with this entry, a Mack YoungSTAR family coaster.  These coasters are small, but have a good variety of dips and turns that they look fun anyway.  The 4 instances of this coaster have been of the same layout model.  But for some reason, this coaster is slightly different in the fact that they took away the first drop.  Yes, in another ‘wtf, China!?’ moment, the ride’s first drop levels out less than halfway down to the ground and continues along flat until the first corner.  If anybody can explain why anyone would do this, please do.  For now, we’ll just assume this family coaster was too darn intense.

Unknown, China Dinosaur Park, Jiangsu

If you’re wanting to check out the major coasters on this list, skip to next year and this park.  For now, we’ll take a look at the two coasters this park intends to open this year.  First we have an unknown steel coaster, which is noted as looping.  Judging by previous experience we could hazard a guess to say that this will probably be something similar to a loopscrew design by Arrow and Vekoma, just poorly made and with over the shoulder restraints (fun fact: this describes like 50% of the coasters in China).  The other coaster will be a Zamperla Motocoaster with a (thankfully) custom design.  The stats are currently listed at 70ft. tall and 30mph, making it the tallest of the Zamperla designs out there.  One would hope they’ll do more than some nice meandering corners dropping slowly.  We’ll come back to this park in a year for maybe the most significant entry on this list.

Knight Valley, Guangdong

Another new park, Knight Valley is actually part of a much larger resort area, developed by the same people that are involved with the Happy Valley parks.  This coasters at this park suddenly popped up on everyone’s radar a few weeks ago as GCI posted designs of their wooden coaster for the park, making everyone wish they lived there.  At 147ft., this will be GCI’s largest creation to date, and at 4,817ft. it’ll be their longest (by over 1,200ft.).  The ride is pretty much what you might envision looking at a big hill and thinking ‘a coaster down the side of that would be really darn cool.’  The ride starts with a triple down, keeping close to the ground the entire time.  As the trees turn into a blur, the coaster hits various turns and bumps all designed to produce the usual awesome GCI airtime.  The ride features a station fly-by and a fully underground tunnel, showing that when you give somebody enough money, they can make one of the best looking coasters out there.  Thankfully, the ride uses GCI’s amazing Millennium Flyer trains, meaning this ride should stay pretty smooth no matter how clueless these people are taking care of it.  Much less interesting, but just as notable is a Maurer Sohne X-Car coaster.  We still have yet to see the full layout of the Sky Loop design exhibited by the company.  Sadly, this is just the single sky loop design as seen at Skyline Park and Magic Springs.  While the restraints are hit or miss it seems, the ride should be pretty exciting, especially for a region of the world that hasn’t seen anything like it.

World Joyland, Jiangsu

I guess by now we should stop being surprised by new parks opening.  Hopefully, though, this park will be as cool as the concept art, which shows some really crazy abstract theming with a few cool coasters mixed in.  The first ride is unknown, yet lists two lift hills, which leads us to believe it’s probably the usual mine train design.  The next is another Maurer X-Coaster with the sky loop design we say at Knight Valley.  2 in 1 year might be a surprise if it were anywhere else besides here.  The most interesting coaster is a custom B&M flying coaster that has what could potentially be the coolest layout of the type.  I talked about this ride in my very first post on this blog, so if you feel like reading even more than you already have (I’m impressed you’ve made it this far.  We’re almost done!), go check that out.  The ride lists the inversion order as being an inline twist, loop, and double corkscrew.  The layout has not been published, but with a listing like that, you know it’s going to be interesting.  The main question is whether the loop will be outside or inside, a design concept debated for years by forumgoers everywhere.  Regardless of which design type, it’s never been done before by B&M, so what we’re seeing here will be completely new.

2011

Coasters: 2 over 2 parks

Unknown, Knight Valley, Guangdong

Apparently Knight Valley really likes Maurer Sohne because they’re getting another X-car for 2011.  Not as stupid as getting an inverted coaster from two different companies (calling you out again, La Ronde), this type is a launched version of the style, the same kind as seen at Drievliet.  While the layout isn’t terrible impressive, it manages to sneak in 2 inversions and some weird shaped angles we’ve come to expect from X-car coasters.

Unknown, China Dinosaur Park, Jiangsu

It’s fun to study Chinese parks because there’s so little news coming over to the US or European enthusiast community.  News tends to come suddenly, no rumors, just suddenly a big announcement.  This happened earlier this year when S&S showed a concept art drawing of a new 4-D coaster for the park.  We’ve only seen 2 of this type of coaster, and only one of those from S&S.  A lot of this is due to these coasters being so incredibly expensive, that very few can afford them, let alone the maintenance.  It’s actually a wonder that anyone would buy another one of these after all the maintenance issues that X went through.  But nevertheless, the 3^rd 4-D coaster will hopefully open in 2011.  The layout hasn’t been shown yet, but we can take a guess that it’ll probably be similar to Eejanaika.  It’d be nice to see some new things tried, but that might be a little bit much to hope for on a coaster that’ll likely be broken down anyway.

2012

Coasters: 3 over 1 park

Chimelong Hengqin Island, Guangdong

This project is by the same folks that did the Chimelong Project in Guangzhou.  Like that park, this will be a resort with a bunch of other over the top stuff along with the park.  RCDB lists a marine park, a safari, and a hotel.  So once again, here’s people not afraid to spend their money.  Right now there’s 3 coaster listed, although that number is almost certainly going to change with the park still being 2 years out.  The first two coasters are listed as Mack water coasters, a SuperSplash and a regular water coaster.  Neither of these are too exciting, although they have the potential to be pretty nicely themed as we’ve sort of come to expect from Chinese parks.  The last coaster is still unknown and was just recently listed on the coaster database.  So far, there’s nothing listed for the ride aside from the length, which is listed at a huge 6,561ft.  With the current worldwide stats, this would be the 6^th longest coaster in the world, just short of Millennium Force’s mark.  Hopefully this will be a good coaster and not another Daidarasaurus.  I’m sure time will tell as some more information surfaces about the park.

A Summary

So those are the notable from the past few years and looking forward to the next couple.  Of course, there’s likely much more on the way for 2011, 2012, and probably even 2010 as the year progresses.  China is certainly the forefront of coaster construction and even development as we’re seeing some different types of layouts.  And it’s not just coasters; these parks are getting great themes to go along with everything.  It’s clear they have more money than they know what to do with.  Thankfully they’re introducing China to the world of coasters; a region which has traditionally been lacking in the amusement industry.

Of listed coasters on the coaster database, we’ve seen 73 coasters built in China since 2006.

To compare, coasters since 2006, by continent:

• Africa: 1
• Asia: 156
• Australia: 2
• Europe: 206
• North America: 151
• South America: 14

Europe is still the leader, although I hazard I guess that per large coasters, Asia is about in par.  That said, China is just one country, producing 73 coasters themselves.  Only the United States has more coasters since 2006 and most of those are smaller coaster for smaller family parks.  When you look at the scale and general quality of rides, China is right up there with the best.

For one final study, here’s a map of China with all the parks we looked at in this entry.  You can see the development is happening all over, not just one area of the country.  [Click to enlarge]

Well.. that’s it!  If you made it this far, then I’m impressed.  Hopefully the next entry will be sooner than it took to put this one up.  Coming up next week is a trip to Texas to visit Six Flags over Texas, Six Flags Fiesta Texas, and Kemah Boardwalk.  I’ll put up some pictures and maybe a report or two once I get home.  I’ll also be off to Intimidator at Carowinds media day, so we’ll have some coverage of that.  Hope you enjoyed today’s entry!

The Little Park That Couldn’t

Last week we got word that Six Flags Kentucky Kingdom would be shutting down for good.  While not entirely surprising, it did happen a few years earlier then I thought it might.  If you missed it, here’s the press release:

Six Flags announced today that as it nears the scheduled end of its restructuring process, it has decided to reject its lease with the Kentucky State Fair Board relating to the Kentucky Kingdom park. In recent weeks, Six Flags had proposed a new lease arrangement to the fair board that would have enhanced the viability and future of the park. Unfortunately, those proposals were not accepted and the park will cease operations and the company will move expeditiously to re-locate employees and several of the more than 40 rides and attractions to one of its 13 other markets.

“We are deeply disappointed to be leaving such a great fan base in the greater metropolitan area of Louisville and we are grateful to the thousands of employees at Kentucky Kingdom and the millions of guests for their dedication, support and loyalty over the years,” said Mark Shapiro, Six Flags President and CEO.

“This action relates solely to Kentucky Kingdom,” Shapiro continued. “The substantial lease payment has been a significant hurdle for this park in recent years. Our other parks, which reside largely on company-owned land, will be completely unaffected and will open as scheduled for the full 2010 season.”

So there you have it.  Six Flags decided they wanted out.  If you’re familiar with the park (or just pay attention to news and have some amount of insight), then you probably saw this coming.  First, a bit about the park.  SFKK was expanded out of the Kentucky State Fairgrounds.  It was actually like 2 parks in one… an entrance area led to a circle of path and general amusement rides (mostly kid-friendly).  Then in one of the biggest wtf moves you’ll find at an American park, a little bridge crossed over about 4 lanes of traffic (the fair complex outer loop road) to get to the waterpark and more thrilling attractions.  At maybe 6 or 8ft. wide, it’s a wonder you didn’t have huge lines of people on either side waiting to cross.  Then again, maybe that says something.  The coaster selection wasn’t terribly impressive, although it felt about right.  The wild mouse had clever theming out front and the Schwarzkopf shuttle loop was on its 3^rd life and hanging on as the last operating of its type to grace US soil.  (It’s up to Brazil and South Africa to take it from here…)  Jumping across the road we had the park’s two wooden coasters.  Thunder Run was reminiscent of the Hurler models, with maybe a little more character thrown in there with the random kinks in the track on the big out and back section.  Twisted Twins was  a rather oddity of a ride as a quirky half-assed dueling coaster.  The crossed lifts were cool, opposed drops were cooler.  The rest of the ride was rather forgettable even with the last dueling spot in there (with a huge section of parallel track so they really didn’t have to completely figure out the timing).  Gerstlauer trains and wood on steel construction gave the ride a lot of character (read: pain), and placement way back behind a bunch of stuff made it rather hard to find.  The Vekoma kiddie let you go around twice… even more embarrassment in just one ride!  T² is rather universally hated in the coaster world for even existing.  That’s not entirely off-base, although I didn’t think it was near as bad as everybody said.  Being able to kick the overgrown trees and bushes on the way up the lift made it feel especially janky.  And it was.  Chang was the out of place star attraction… too big for the park and what might be considered too awesome to be there.  The initial 3 trains was cut to 2 because who’s really going to fill 96 seats worth of coaster here?  (and who’s really going to run a stand up coaster where 3 trains can run smoothly?  Hint: no one)  The ride itself was wonderful, miles better then than the similar ride up north, yet never getting the recognition because of its setting.  The 7 coasters sat together as a testament that even a lot of mediocrity can be kind of fun once in a while.

Hurricane Harbor had become the park’s main event as it neared demise.  The whole thing sat in the center of the side across the road and the rest of the park wrapped around it.  A single entrance controlled those in and those out and frustrated the heck out of anyone who didn’t bring a map.  While the amusement rides side of thing languished, the Harbor got a tornado slide, a bowl slide and the US’s first LIM launched waterslide.  One should take care to note that closing times of water parks are often different from the closed parks… otherwise this author might have gotten to ride it. Potential bitterness aside, the waterpark section carried a decent, if obligatory, nautical theme and seemed to do its job grabbing the bulk of the visitors to the park.  While I’m still a little lost on the whole ‘waterpark in a park’ concept that people seem to be loving these days, I’m guessing it worked.  Until the closure announcement, the park had been willing to ship Chang off to go hang out in a parking lot in favor of a waterpark expansion.  When you dump your biggest ride in favor of a waterpark, you know it was a big asset.

Probably the biggest claim to fame SFKK would ever get was the drop tower incident.  Hellevator, as I will always refer to it despite the name change, was one of the best drop towers out there.  Quick and simple, it took you up and dropped you down without and spinning or tilting or sprinkles.  But SFKK learned the hard way that you should probably inspect things once in a while.  In what must have been a pretty awful thing to watch, a girl exited the ride sans feet before getting one sewn back in the hospital later on.  Lawsuits abounded and soon everybody was taking a second look at their cables.  While the girl affected has long since been forgotten, there’s no doubt that 30 years to come in any amusement park out there, some ‘tard in line for the drop tower will say they’re hoping not to lose their feet.  Sadly, most of them won’t.  For SFKK, the lasting effect was the loss of a much needed thrill ride and entrance focal point (note to parks—design spaces like this!) and a public not really sure if they can trust what they’re riding.

The park managed to shuffle on for a little while longer.  A lot of reviews weren’t pleasant, although on two experiences I had a great time including a particularly exciting moment of being evacuated from Chang’s platform in the thunderstorm from hell.  SFKK managed to become a park with great buildings and a very nice atmosphere without being ostentatious.  It had the charm of a non-chain park while still having all the advertisements and over hyped marketing that we’ve come to expect and revile from Six Flags.  But after the Hellevator incident, there wasn’t much good to say anymore.  With the drop tower gone, the balance of attractions shifted fully across the road.  Even before the loss of limbs, the park’s S&S dragster attraction had shut down, taking away one of the park’s most unique rides.  Then Twisted Twins closed as 2007 rolled around.  And not just the coaster.  The entire path spur including a splash boats ride and several smaller rides shut down to save some cash.  If you weren’t starting to see if coming by now, then you were probably an idiot.  2009 brought rumors, confirmation, and removal of Chang in under a month as the park prepared for the waterpark expansion.   At this point, the leading assumption was that SFKK could become a waterpark only attraction.  A good theory, judging by the proposed expansion and general interest on the part of guests, but one that we sadly never got played out.  The February 4^th closure announcement left the enthusiast community all saying they saw it coming (which probably isn’t terribly far off reality).  The offseason closure also means no farewell sendoff for the devout SFKK fans (all 3?) or locals that could appreciate a worthwhile coaster.  If you’re feeling cheesy, go have a ride of silence for the little park that apparently couldn’t.

So now to speculation.  Things are closed and presumably won’t be left to rot.  It’s an unfortunate expectation that the wooden coasters will probably join the less-than-noble ranks of the scrap heap before long.  Most people would probably like to see T² do the same, although it seems like a ride Six Flags might be willing to ship elsewhere.  Just about all their parks have an inverted coaster now, although it’s not out of the question for one to have another join in (that’s right LaRonde, I’m calling you out in a 2^nd straight post).  Most likely to go elsewhere are the kiddie coaster and mouse which are universally generic enough to get plopped just about anywhere.  Maybe SFMM can add them both to pad their coaster count… since it’s about quantity, right?  Right?  Greezed Lightning will hopefully have a future (message from SFOG: we’ll take it back), although it’s already well travelled.  As much as I don’t want to think it, Six Flags America could do well with the ride where it could join the ranks off 10 minute loading times and people who’d rather be elsewhere.  These coasters all fit the bill of being small rides that should be relatively easy to cart of to a new park and advertise as shiny and new.  But what about the water rides?  I’ll admit, I really don’t know much about relocations of this sort of thing, although it seems pretty straightforward.  Deluge had only just started its life, so I expect that will be the first to get sent off.  Most of the older slides will probably be forgotten, although the bowl slide and tornado could pretty easily find a home at another growing Six Flags waterpark that doesn’t already have those—which may be rather hard to find.  Either way, it’s unlikely Six Flags will waste time in finding new homes for these rides.  With the 2011 anniversary year coming up, they’ve just acquired a bunch of ‘new’ attractions to use.  How convenient.

SFKK now falls into the ranks of the Geauga Lake’s and Astroworld’s of the amusement industry.  We’ll look back in a few years and probably remember Twisted Twins as being awesome or the park having the best of something or another.  The loss of that park might mean bigger business for Holiday World and Beech Bend, who could both use some more recognition.  This is never the way you want to see a park go, but hopefully some rides will see another life.

Cool theming.

Overgrown entrance.

You can kick all of those bushes.

Lots of bushes in the way.

Whoosh.

Terrible?

The waterpark was pretty much the only part getting additions.

At least the park looks great.

One good coaster, one terrible one, and a waterpark.

Typical wild mouse and stuff… and a cool Schwarzkopf in there.

Pictured: Water Ride for sale

Thunder Run: maybe better than Hurler.

Hellevator is still the greatest name ever.

It’s Better the Second Time Around

Tonight’s post is going to be a bit of a short one while I’m still going hard on the database project.  Before we get to the article, I wanted to highlight some of the things I’ve found so far.  While building this huge tree of connected parks through relocations, it seems there’s always a few parks that are the nexus of everything.  It’s often kind of surprising which ones they turn out to be.  I had figured Prater Park in Vienna to have quite a few since it has 30 coaster past and present combined (awesome park, perhaps worthy of a post later).  But here’s some of the big one’s I’ve gotten so far… I suspect there’s many more to come:

Jolly Roger Amusement Park (Maryland): 2 from, 5 to, 7 total relocations

Alton Towers (England): 5 from, 3 to, 8 total relocations

Flamingoland (England): 3 from, 5 to, 8 total relocations

Others with 4: Steel Pier (New Jersey), Playland Park (New York), Selva Magica (Mexico), American Adventures Theme Park (England), Movie Park Germany (Germany [duh]), Cedar Point (Ohio), Boardwalk and Baseball (Florida)

Like I said—this isn’t complete—I know Geauga Lake will turn out to have quite a few outgoing as will Six Flags Astroworld.  If I can finish this tree in the next millennium then there will be a big story about it.  I’m drawing the tree out on an 18×24 sheet of paper and it’s hilariously large.

But now to today’s article:

This is a little sooner than I was intending to write this, but I came across it again while adding it to the database and figured I’d go ahead and do a quick story.  Phantom’s Revenge at Kennywood is only 19 years old, but It’s already lived 2 lives.  This type of change is relatively unique in the coaster world as what’s essentially a brand new coaster was built out of the old one.

Back in 1991, Arrow’s 2^nd hypercoaster opened as Kennywood’s Steel Phantom.  This was one of the first coasters to raise the debate of what exactly classified a coaster as hyper.  Yes, there was a drop greater than 200ft., but it was the 2^nd, not the initial dip.  The lift hill was also well under the 200ft. mark.  Further complication matters, Arrow decided to throw in some inversions to the mix.  This meant that the ride would get over the shoulder restraints, which made the collective coaster enthusiast world cringe.  Perhaps ignoring better judgment, the coaster opened and was met with largely positive reviews, despite the bruising.  A 160ft. lift hill led to a turning and diving drop before going up for the 2^nd hill.  225ft. later, riders were down in a ravine and behind Thunderbolt, which the ride passes through on the drop.  This kind of thing took interaction to a whole new level.  They weren’t going to pass close by to the other ride, they were going to fly THROUGH it.  After the interesting opening, Steel Phantom took a left turn and headed up into the curious inversion section.  Usually when a park buys a coaster, they have to decide on a specific type.  It seems like Kennywood just said “We’ll take both.  But make it one coaster.”   Unfortunately at this time, Arrow was about the only company to go to for this sort of thing, although they still seemed to be in the mindset that all inversions should be the exact same size, no matter what coaster.  This led to tiny loops placed hilariously high off the ground.  A huge lead-in hill slowed the train enough to send it through the usual Arrow loop and batwing as seen 9 years earlier on Darien Lake’s Viper.  From there, it seems Arrow realized it might actually be possible to not have one size of corkscrew.  Steel Phantom features a long and wide corkscrew with a slightly thicker spine to support the element.  A final oddly shaped helix leads back under the corkscrew and up into the brakes.  Despite being a large coaster, Arrow must’ve run out of ideas quickly because it’s over in only 3000ft.  Although popular, Steel Phantom featured all the jolts and strange sections of banking that make the company so easy to make fun of.  But by 2000, it seems Kennywood was ready for a change.

Rather than scrap a 9 year old several million dollar investment in pain, Kennywood decided to do the sensible thing… and just replace half of it.  Morgan was brought in to give the ride a total overhaul and turn it into an actual hyper coaster.  In what must have been pretty satisfying, the 4 inversions were torn out… as was everything from about halfway down the 2^nd drop.  Figuring the lift and hill were at least decent, Morgan started their track halfway down the big drop.  Because 225ft. just wasn’t good enough, they also upped the drop by 3ft.  Poor Thunderbolt was once again torn apart as new track was laid through in not just one but two locations.  Instead of heading off into pain, the big drop now led to a high banked helix with about 8,000 supports before diving back through Thunderbolt.  Next up were the expected airtime hills.  While other Morgan coasters had very standard, receding segments of hills, it seems somebody might have had a seizure while designing the back end of Phantom’s layout.  Tiny little hills including a ridiculous double down provide massive amounts of airtime.  Despite the length being increased to 3200ft., there’s not much in the way of hills, but what’s there is certainly strong.  In continuing with Kennywood’s efforts of being cheap (or wanting to recycle, your choice), they reused the old Arrow train chassis.  Removing the over the shoulder restraints (to a collective cheer from the enthusiast community), Morgan created a new lap bar that operated from the side so they could reuse the mechanism from the old Arrow trains.  With a repaint and a rebranding as Phantom’s Revenge, it was ready to go.

It was probably a pretty big surprise for everybody when on the first test runs, the coaster slid right through the brakes and into the station (reportedly anyways).  When you can’t have a longer brake run, it appears you just make part of the course into one.   Trim brakes sit on the 2^nd to last and last hill on the course to scrub off some of the huge amount of speed the ride has on the way back to the station.  Thankfully, it seems the ride actually stops now.  It’s also quite popular with general guests and even enthusiasts (ranked 25^th in the most recent steel coaster poll).  While it would be awesome to see them edit the coaster again in a few years to make it longer or something (or maybe reinsert inversions just to confuse the heck out of people), it seems Kennywood got it right the 2^nd time around.

Busch Gardens Africa: What’s on the Way?

Way back in 2007, there were already the first rumors of the next Busch Gardens coaster.  SheiKra had been recently converted to floorless and the speculation was already running wild.  Prevailing theories had a B&M hypercoaster pegged for the park.  In March of 07, screamscape.com wrote:

“If the latest rumors are true, Busch Gardens Tampa may be thinking of adding their own version of Apollo’s Chariot, a fantastic B&M Hypercoaster”

First off, I’ll note that fantastic is entirely the wrong word right there.  I’d be more inclined to say poor or dull.  In what turned out to be one of the worst of the B&M hyper installations, Apollo’s Chariot lacks any real impressive airtime on a layout that we really wish rode as good as it looked.  But a hypercoaster for the other Busch Gardens?  Let’s take a look.

It’s relatively safe to say that if it’s a big coaster, the park will be going for B&M.  Busch Gardens and the Sea World parks all operate under the same company (Busch Entertainment Corporation until recently).  The parks have a history of B&M coasters with Manta and Kraken at Sea World Orlando, Great White at Sea World San Antonio, Griffon, Alpengeist, and Apollo’s Chariot at Busch Gardens Europe, and SheiKra, Montu, and Kumba at Busch Gardens Africa.  For only 5 parks, 9 B&Ms is a pretty sizeable number.

So if we assume B&M, what type would it be?  B&M offers 7 models of rides, diving machine, floorless, flying, inverted, hyper, sitting, and standing.  We can rule out diving coaster, inverted and sitting as the park already has that (unless they want to pull a LaRonde and add two inverted coasters).  Floorless is unlikely since it does the same thing as Kumba, just without a floor.  While standing would be hilarious since we haven’t seen one since 1999, I’m relatively certain Busch isn’t going to install something to screw with enthusiasts.   That leaves us with flying and hyper, the two most likely installations.  Looking at just the park, a flying coaster seems like a pretty good choice for theming ability and ride type.  When you look at the larger picture, it’s unlikely a flying coaster will come to the park since Sea World just added Manta last year.  So that leaves a hypercoaster like most of the rumors have been saying.

There’s been at least one hypercoaster from B&M over the last 5 years: Intimidator for 2010, Diamondback at Kings Island in 2009, Behemoth at Canada’s Wonderland in 2008, Hollywood Dream for Universal Japan in 2007, and the two Goliaths in 2006 for Six Flags over Georgia and LaRonde.    From 2008 in, the installations have all been with a new train style.  While reducing the capacity by 4, the staggered seating option allows for better views all around.  From the coaster enthusiast’s perspective, you also have a train almost twice as long as the old one, so the disparity of forces is a lot bigger, meaning stronger airtime on the ends (or just no airtime in the middle depending on how much of a cynic you are).  Although they’ve all been added to Cedar Fair coasters, I think it’s a pretty safe bet we’ll see them everywhere now.

At the park, survey markers have started popping up all around now.  Rumors say that the park may try and reuse part of the skyride’s station that once housed the loading area for the inverted monorail.  This does seem like a pretty good way to reuse resources (although we’ll hope they might give it a retheme so it doesn’t look like a giant box).  Click on the image below to make it bigger and you can see the skyride marked in red and the yellow box being the proposed station.  All the markings seem to be around the skyride right now, which makes sense as they’ve just closed it for a few months.  Most of the survey markers have popped up by the Nairobi train station and fit into that big yellow polygon thing on my map.  Behind the station, we see some markers by the old Clydesdale barn (guess it’s good the horses left after all…) that could make a turn around after the brake run.  Rumors have also mentioned the ride going up and over the water section of Rhino Rally (up and to the right of the polygon), although I haven’t seen any pictures of flags towards that direction.  If you stretch it out over that run and run the coaster a little bit back towards where the animals are (presumably scaring the crap out of them in the process), then you have a pretty good strip to throw a hypercoaster into.

Right now, I would put my money on a hypercoaster from B&M.  There’s really no telling which way the park will go, however, making me glad I’m not a betting man.   Looking at a big coaster with airtime, B&M seems to be the way to go as of late, and with rides like Behemoth and Diamondback getting pretty impressive ratings, I think it’s safe to say a hyper would be a good choice.

Collect them All: Morgan Hypercoasters

The other day during a quick session of rcdb browsing, I came across Six Flags Mexico’s Superman once again.  I’ve always found the ride interesting, so in an excuse to write about it, I decided to take a look at the Morgan hyper coasters.  From 1996 to 2001 (would have been 2002 if Superman happened as planned), Morgan opened a big coaster each year.  With designer Steve Okamoto at the head of many of the coasters, Morgan coasters exemplified the traditional out and back coaster, just a lot larger than most companies had gone before.

Cedar Fair’s Sister Hypers

I suppose it’s natural to start with the 3 Morgan hypers most enthusiasts have heard of.  Starting in 1996, Cedar Fair gave 3 parks hyper coasters, one each year.  ValleyFair! (which at that time still had the name permanently exciting) kicked it off with Wild Thing, followed by Dorney Park’s Steel Force and World’s of Fun with Mamba.

With Wild Thing’s arrival at Valleyfair!, the small park in the heart of cold unpleasantry got a swift jolt of excitement.  Standing over 200ft. tall, the ride made the rest of the park’s coasters look really small and insignificant (which, as it turns out, they already were).  Wild Thing is essentially an out and back coaster.  As the name might give a slight hint to, the coaster goes out and then comes back.  Unfortunately for Valleyfair!, it seems Morgan was just starting to figure out the whole thrilling coaster thing, which means Wild Thing comes up a little short in most people’s eyes.  When the coaster reaches the turnaround, it seems to forget where it’s going and just meanders around for a little while until it finds the mid-course brake run.  A lot of straight track and big corners make the ride a little less wild and perhaps more like some of the park’s smaller rides.  This isn’t necessarily bad, of course, as it means the ride’s appeal is much more suited for lots of age ranges.  The 2^nd half of the coaster is certainly more redeeming than the first, with 4 airtime hills (one in a tunnel) leading back to the station.  If this coaster seems overly familiar, then chances are you probably remember the accident in 2006 when the rear car became detached from the track.  18 were injured and presumably pissed, but there were no deaths or losses of limbs.  The ride is still running, however, which we can only assume means everything is just fine for another ride in Valleyfair!’s giant coaster.

Morgan’s ’97 coaster headed to eastern Pennsylvania to Dorney Park.  Steel Force is quite a lot more to the point than Wild Thing.  With a big first drop and second hill, the ride swings into a huge righthand helix.  While you’re head is most likely safe, the close calls with the supports might make you duck.  Watch you’re hands, though.  If they’re lax about cutting back the trees, you may end up with a handful of tree branch as I did on one occasion.  For some reason the mid course brake section is about 3 times as long as it needs to be, which we can only assume is the park giving us time to look around.  Thanks, guys.  3 and a half airtime hills close off the coaster with the half a hill making sure your butt is slammed down into the seat before the coaster heads towards the brakes.  Steel Force grabs a page from Wild Thing and slaps some tunnels onto the coaster—one on the first drop, and another on the return home.  Like the other Morgan coasters, it seems like the airtime likes to hide sometime.  Check out any forums with thoughts on the coaster and you’ll have a contingency swearing the ride has fantastic airtime and rest saying there’s not to be had.  I’ll sit in the center and say that while it’s no Intamin ejector, the airtime can be decently strong on the return leg.  While it’s probably no longer the king of the park, Steel Force is a solid hyper coaster all around.     [Trivia: Steel Force’s logo was originally going to be used on Cedar Point’s Mantis when the ride was to be called Banshee.  When that fell through, the logo came to Dorney.]

Mamba is the last of the Cedar Fair giants, opening in the middle of the country at World’s of Fun.  Going solely by the layout, this coaster is the most refined of the 3 rides.  The usual big drop and hill leads into another right helix that drops down to the ground and stays there for the whole corner.   Again the supports will try to remove your head, so watch out for that.  After the helix, the coaster takes a bit of a siesta as it head for the midcourse brakes.  The 2^nd half of the ride runs through a 5 hills, meaning you should find airtime somewhere in there.  Although a lot like Steel Force in terms of layout, Worlds of Fun foregoes the tunnels in a move that should make most sigh with distaste.  One thing to note with Morgan hypers is just how high off the track the rider sits.  Unlike Arrows, which put the guest pretty much between the rails (all the more closer to pain?), Morgans sit way up on top of the track.  Although heartlining is more difficult the further away from the track a ride gets, Morgan seems to have done something right as their rides tend to be smooth and lacking in blood loss.  One reason there’s a lot less pain than your average (or above average) Vekoma is that the transitions on the Morgan hypers are long and drawn out.  Although it’s not always a good thing for a ride to take a mile or two to make a corner, there’s a lot less chance for pain.  Thankfully, it leaves riders a lot more satisfied and a lot less likely to sue for pain and emotional damages.

Morgan goes to Texas

After 3 years, it seems Cedar Fair had its fill of Morgan.  But other parks were ready to see what they had offer.  Sea World San Antonio decided to follow up their surprise B&M inverted coaster purchase with a not-quite-hypercoaster.  If you want to go strictly by the definition of a hypercoaster, than Steel Eel falls 50ft. short at only a 150ft. tall.  But the ride follows all the characteristics of any of the rides that are a whole lot bigger… mainly hills.  Steel Eel’s lift hill uses column supports instead of their usual lattice, which leads to some hilariously large columns.  Thankfully, Sea World decided to do something a little different with the layout, so it’s not just one long strip and a big helix.  A few extra slight turns thrown in for good measure turn the layout into a really big triangle.  Rather than a helix, a diving corner leads to 4 hills on the home stretch.  Since the ride goes up an over paths on several occasions, Morgan solved the problem of crossing spans with angled supports.  While effective (seeing as the ride is still standing), it still looks amusing and potentially unstable.  Steel Eel remains the only of the Morgan hypers under 200ft.

Heading East.  Really East.

Everybody knows that Millennium Force was the first complete circuit coaster to break 300ft.  I expect that less realize it only held the height record for a little over 2 months.  Morgan came out of nowhere and added over 100ft. onto their largest coaster with Steel Dragon 2000 at Nagashima Spaland.  At 318ft., it’s still the biggest coaster with a lift hill.  This hugely expensive coasters hits the scale button on their usual hyper coasters, increasing all the stats.  If you just took the 2^nd hill height, SD2000 would be the 9^th tallest coaster in the world.  Still the longest coaster anywhere, the ride is over 1.5 miles long.  The layout is actually quite typical… just really darn big.  The ride’s turnaround still includes several helixes and the obligatory boring flatish section before the mid course brakes.  With a lot further to go to get back to the station, SD2000 has time for 7 airtime hills, two of which have tunnels.  A bit of extra excitement comes from flying through the lattice supports on the return leg.  Since Japan is earthquake city, the supports are beefed up to a ridiculously impressive level.  Heading into the turnaround, you have an almost unnecessarily large amount of support with 3 big columns converging together at every support point.   In 2003, one of the wheel bases on the coaster fell off, landing on a guy in a pool at the nearby waterpark.  While it most certainly ruined that guy’s day (I believe he did live, however), it also closed down the coaster for three years.  A lot of the reason for the long closure is because the Japanese are superstitious, but I suspect a lot of the downtime was also figure out why the crap a piece of the coaster fell off.  Somewhere along the line they figured it out, however, since you can now go take a ride on the world’s biggest parking lot coaster.

Putting on a Sombrero

Superman was the last Morgan hyper, debuting 2 years later than originally planned.  Six Flags’s only park south of the border got into a bit of an argument with the Mexican government, which meant the coaster, got to chill in the parking lot until 2004. The coaster finally opened up to the excitement of Mexicans and the occasional Mexico City tourist that hasn’t been killed.  Superman actually ended up being the most unique of the Morgan hypers.  The coaster starts out with a prelift section of a few hills and corners before engaging the lift hill.  A little bit of a curve at the bottom of the first drop, leads through a tiny tunnel and another hill to start the turnaround section.  In a move that feels a little like a small SD2000, there are 2 inclined helixes and some really close calls to the ground before the mid brakes.  Happily enough, there’s no dead section this time.  Maybe they forgot.  Only two airtime hills get riders back to the station area where the designer must’ve remember to add the dead section here before the brakes.   It may not be the best of the Morgan coasters, but it’s certainly the most interesting.  As far as we know, Superman has kept all its wheels and is still the most popular coaster in the park.

Some Other Mentions

I made the decision not to include Phantom’s Revenge in this article as I intend to write a story on that for an article later on.  The ride can technically be classed as a Morgan hyper.. or at least half of one.   Originally an Arrow ride, Morgan spend the 2000-2001 offseason removing all the parts that reportedly sucked and replacing it with airtime so strong it’s painful.  Although easily the shortest of the hypers, it seems that the ride has a lot of kick at Kennywood has a winner on their hands.

There’s only 2 other Morgan coasters, so we might as well take note so they don’t feel left out.  Santa Monica West Coaster has to be the most filmed coaster anywhere.  If there’s a coaster in a commercial, 9 times out of 10 it will be this one.  While I’m sure that comes down to location, we’d hope they’d pick a little more thrilling of coasters than something with a helix and 1 hill.  Also in California is Quicksilver Express at Gilroy Gardens.  While the park is worth a visit just for the cool topiaries, Morgan’s only instance of a mine train has two lift hills, multiple tunnels, and a whole bunch of corners in really nice atmosphere.